The Netherlands has a long-standing history of receiving immigrants from both Western and non-Western ethnic backgrounds. The manuscript investigates the extent to which increasing levels of social interaction measured by the number of native-born friends play a role in immigrants' internal political efficacy. Internal political efficacy is a psychological concept defined as one's self-perception of one's ability to understand politics. Employing panel data, we mainly show that friendship with native-born individuals has different sizeable effects for Western immigrants than non-Western immigrants. As the number of close native-born friends increases, so does the sense of internal political efficacy, but only for Western immigrants. In the case of non-Western immigrants, the results point to the opposite: An increase in the number of close Dutch friends reduces non-Western immigrants' sense of internal political efficacy. Findings also partially showed that the positive effect of Dutch friends on internal political efficacy is the most pronounced in the case of second-generation immigrants with a Western origin. The result reveals the different levels of integration of these large groups of immigrants in Dutch society.

Abstract This paper explores how individual self-reported unhappiness interrelates with political interactions. We focus on three types of activities: participating in political debates, encouraging others to vote, and motivating fellow citizens to act politically. Contrary to theoretical expectations and the empirical claims of previous studies, the results of our multilevel logistic regression analysis on World Values Survey data from 2017 and 2021 show that general unhappiness positively correlates with engagement in political interactions. Our analysis provides evidence that overall unhappy individuals are more likely to influence political information flow in their networks than those who report moderate and higher happiness levels. This finding infers that the unhappy mental state does not necessarily correlate with withdrawal from political conversations, self-isolation, and scarcity of political interaction. Conversely, unhappiness is likely to trigger a higher number of interpersonal exchanges on political matters. Suggesting that the relationship between unhappiness and participation may be more complex than previously assumed, our results contribute to related studies by demonstrating that unhappiness does not create solitary citizenry: unhappy people are among the influential citizens politically.

Abstract This article examines how institutional opportunity structures, discursive environments, and individual-level grievances shape political participation among migrants. Specifically, it investigates the effects of local voting rights for non-nationals, public attitudes towards migrants, and perceived discrimination on two forms of political engagement: voting and protest. Grounded in the political opportunity structure framework and grievance-based theories, the study formulates distinct expectations for electoral and non-electoral behaviour: perceived discrimination is hypothesized to discourage voting but mobilize protests. These effects are expected to be moderated by broader discursive context—public attitudes towards migrants. The analysis uses data from Rounds 7 to 10 (2014–2022) of the European Social Survey (ESS), covering 13 Western European countries with varied migration histories and policies. To ensure comparability within a shared institutional framework, voting analysis is restricted to migrant-origin citizens, while protest includes both migrant-origin citizens and non-citizens. The sample includes 13,358 migrants (7050 eligible to vote) and 91,905 natives. Findings show that local voting rights significantly increase voting. Perceived discrimination has no direct effect on voting but increases protest activity, particularly in countries with favourable public attitudes. These effects diminish in hostile environments. The findings confirm the relevance of grievances and opportunity structures in shaping migrant political behaviour.